Rachel Lovegrove uses her 20 years of Iyengar yoga experience and skills as a teacher to provide courses to suit all levels of abilities and experience and has been providing yoga holidays and retreats since 2003. Her passion and enthusiasm for the practice of yoga and the life-enhancing benefits it gives us is what drives her to share with others.She works with individuals from all walks of life at all levels of fitness and health: everyone from sports professionals to those recovering from illness or suffering from stress or depression or simply students wanting to bring a regular practice of yoga into their lives. Her dedication and devotion to helping her students through yoga is at the core of her work.
Rachel Teaching Handstand
Rachel’s main influence in the early days was her mother who took her to her first class when she was just 14 years old. She remembers the feeling of peace and quiet in a room full of normally very stressed and tense mothers and housewives – here they were stretching and relaxing – most unusual! It wasn’t until much later, in her early 20′s that she began regular classes. She was very lucky to find, by chance an amazing Iyengar Yoga teacher in Winchester called Julie. A new student to yoga, Rachel didn’t know about all the different styles that were available, but as soon as she found the Iyengar method, she was hooked.
Iyengar Yoga Training
The attention to detail, the discipline, the physical posture work combined with philosophy, compassion, learning and understanding was everything the Rachel was looking for in a spiritual practice. Through Julie’s influence and generosity, Rachel was encouraged to work hard and eventually went on to train as a teacher of Iyengar yoga. She was incredibly lucky to meet Mr BKS Iyengar in 1993 and to attend classes with some of the most senior teachers in the UK such as Sylvia Prescott, Mira Mehta (author of Yoga, The Iyengar Way), Penny Chaplin, Judi Sweeting, Sasha Perryman, Cathy Rogers-Evans and Judi Soffa. It was while on a yoga holiday to Portugal with Cathy and Judi Soffa that Rachel realised for certain that she wanted to become a teacher.
Rachel in Headstand
The training in Iyengar Yoga for teachers is thorough, it is student-centered and once qualified, teachers have to maintain professional standards through contact with senior teachers, attending study days, regular classes and workshops so that students can benefit. Various levels of certification are attainable but only through years of study and practice – there are no fast-track options in Iyengar Yoga teaching!
Rachel qualified in 2000 and has now attained Junior Intermediate Level II which means she has been examined as having the necessary skills and knowledge to teach intermediate postures and help those students who may have serious medical conditions. She continues to study and keep in contact with senior teachers to maintain her skills and knowledge and in 2006 was delighted to spend a month with the Iyengar family in Pune, studying with Geeta, Prashant and Guruji.
Iyengar Teachers Certification Mark
Only fully qualified teachers in the Iyengar method who have been examined by the Iyengar Yoga Association can use the term Iyengar in their teaching qualifications and bear the Iyengar Certification Mark.
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